exomeme | part seventy six

part seventy six

EXO COMEBACK EUREUREONG

e-x-o

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1769 w!

maybe i should rewatch it hnnghhh

(ty!)

intermission.

"Yixing? Hey, Yixing."

Yixing peels himself blearily away from his desk. Yifan is leaning over, a frown on his face. He looks annoyed. Yixing yawns as he sits up, rubbing at his eyes.

"Oh. What is it?" he asks.

The classroom is still empty. Yixing looks up at the clock - there's still an hour until classes start. He blinks. "You're here early," he says to Yifan.

Yifan shrugs and pulls up a chair. "You didn't wake up. Late night last night?"

Yixing takes a moment to think about this. He shakes his head. "I don't think so," he says. He yawns, unexpectedly, and stifles a giggle. "I don't know why I'm so tired."

Yifan sighs, long and long-suffering. "And you complain I sleep a lot. Here. Take a look at this."

Yixing watches curiously as Yifan reaches into his bag and pulls out a thin folder, placing it on Yixing's desk.

"What's this?" Yixing asks, even as he opens it.

"Just look."

Yixing does. It's several sheets of loose leaf paper, paperclipped together. Each one is lined with Yifan's chicken scrawl, that several months later, Yixing is finally learning to read. He pulls one out and squints at it. "I wish you'd write neater," Yixing says with a sigh.

"If you don't want it—" Yifan huffs and moves to pull the folder back, but Yixing hastily pushes Yifan's hand down.

"I want it, I want it," he says. He smiles, and puts the sheet down as he thumbs through them. "You wrote so many."

Yifan grunts. "I had time," he says. Yixing beams at him.

"Here, this, and this - the two tapes you sent me." Yifan hurriedly ducks his head, and pulls out the appropriate pages. Yixing smoothes a hand over them and grins.

"Thank you," he says. He means it. Something bothers him, and he hesitates. "Yifan..."

Yifan stands abruptly. "I need to get back to basketball practice," he says, and Yixing only then notices that Yifan is faintly covered in sweat, and that he's wearing his gym clothes. Then what had Yifan been doing here? Yixing frowns.

"Why don't you join the music club," Yixing suggests - again. Yifan ignores him, just gives him an absent minded wave as he strolls out the door. For reasons Yixing doesn't understand, Yifan only knows basketball, and only does basketball. That's not entirely true: ever since he walked in on Yixing writing songs, he'll sometimes sit in with him, and sometimes, like today, change or entirely rewrite his lyrics. He's supposed to keep it a secret, too. Yifan had impressed on him, the first time, that no one could know. Would it be that weird if the tall and imposing captain of the basketball team also liked music? Yixing didn't understand. There were lots of things Yixing didn't understand.

And then, at the back - "Youth Song-writing Contest?" Yixing reads aloud from the form. His name is already filled in. The top half is a flyer and an explanation: everyone of school age is encouraged to send in their own original songs, from which a panel of judges will select a pool of runner-ups. If successful, they would then be contacted and invited to send in another three songs for the contention of the grand prize. The grand prize will be awarded in Beijing.

Beijing.

Lu Han still lives in Beijing. At the thought of his childhood friend, Yixing smiles, and reaches into his desk where he keeps Lu Han's latest letter. Despite the years that have passed, he's surprised they still manage to keep in touch. An hour train ride away had been one thing, halfway across the country was another.

Songwriting contest, huh. Where did Yifan even find such a thing? With a final tap of the form, Yixing turns to deciphering Yifan's handwriting instead, a simple melody already forming in his head.

---

episode 2.

"You seem out of it lately. Everything okay?"

Lu Han looks up when Minseok sits down across from him. His co-worker looks genuinely worried, and Lu Han first feels a pang of guilt, before bursting into a wide grin. "You care about me?" he teases. Minseok makes a face and Lu Han laughs, putting his chopsticks down.

Minseok rolls his eyes and pulls out his own lunch. "Something seems to be on your mind," he says.

Lu Han hums. "Not really," he says.

"Liar." Minseok scoffs.

"Not really," Lu Han repeats. His lips twist into a smile. "I've just been...thinking."

"About what?"

"Hmmm."

"Wow, that's such a clear answer. And people tell me I'm bad at Chinese."

Lu Han laughs. "I liked it better when your Chinese sucked and I had to speak to you in Korean."

"Your Korean was so bad it was easier for me to understand Chinese," Minseok retorts. He pauses. "You know, if you ever need someone to talk to..."

"I can practice my Korean with you?" Lu Han laughs again at the face Minseok makes. He knows Minseok is being serious. He lets the smile fall from his own face, as he props his chin in one hand. "Sometimes I forget we're the same age."

Minseok grimaces. "If this is about my face..."

"No." Lu Han shakes his head. "I mean, sometimes it feels like you're so much older."

"Well if we're talking about who's more mature between the two of us, I don't think there's even a question."

"True." Lu Han chuckles. He hesitates, shovels a mouthful of rice into his mouth, and chews. "When I was in high school, we had a student from Korea. He was cute."

"Oh?" Minseok looks up. "Did you meet him recently or something?"

Lu Han shakes his head. "I don't know, I just suddenly remembered him right now. I don't think I've thought about him in years."

"A friend, huh?" Minseok says.

"Something like that."

-

Jongin is the one who first teaches Lu Han Korean.

He's several years younger, and attends the affiliated middle school. Lu Han finds him one day in an empty classroom, the desks pushed to one side, his ear-buds in as he dances by himself. Lu Han had stood there for a few minutes, content to simply watch, before he'd stepped in and waved.

"You're Zhongren, right?" Lu Han says.

The kid looks startled, shrugs his shoulders, nods. "Yeah," he mumbles. "I am."

"Do you think you could teach me to do that?" Lu Han asks. Jongin looks up, surprised. Lu Han nods towards him. "I can't dance at all."

Lu Han can't dance, but he is on the school's soccer team. This means he stays after school a lot. Sometimes, when he doesn't have practice, he meets up with Zhongren. Lu Han likes to call him Zhongzhong, even though Zhongren frowns and insists he's not cute. It goes both ways - Lu Han helps him with his homework, and Zhongren teaches Lu Han how to do a body wave. This is how Lu Han discovers Zhongren is actually an exemplary student, far better than Lu Han is, at any rate.

"My dad is here for work," Zhongren explains quietly. "I spent a year in an international school, but English is difficult for me too, and it's expensive."

"Why didn't you stay in Korea?" Lu Han asks, and Zhongren looks at him as if shocked.

"By myself?" he asks. He shakes his head. "Besides, my sisters..."

Zhongren has two much older sisters, but they're in university, and far too busy to take care of a surly, teenaged brother. So he'd come here, with his parents. He's quiet in class, keeps his head down, and does his work. More than anything, he likes to dance, and before he'd moved, he'd won a few essay contests. Lu Han doesn't tell him that there'd been plenty of rumours that had swirled around the new transfer student anyway, and invites him to karaoke with his friends.

"Come on, it'll be fun, they're nice," Lu Han cajoles, but Zhongren stammers an excuse about having to help his mom with dinner.

Lu Han bikes home on most days. Traffic is crazy, but he's gotten used to it. They live in an apartment in one of those gated complexes, and there's a food stall right outside that he likes to pick up some baozi from on days when he's pretty sure his parents won't be home for dinner. Which happens to be most nights, but they're busy, and it's not like Lu Han can cook. He studies after he gets home. It's just a few hours a day, a lot less than he should be, but it keeps his grades high enough that his parents can't really complain, and leave him alone for the most part.

He thinks they've given up on him, but he's never asked.

He does his homework first, the ones that will be checked. This is the important part. This is the part that needs to be done.

And then there's the practice problems, the one he insists he doesn't do. He smiles to himself wryly. It was a habit he'd picked up a long time ago, and for some reason, it'd stuck.

In the end, he hadn't gone to karaoke either. "I think my mom wants me home for dinner," he'd said, knowing full well she wasn't going to be home. Everyone had been sad, saying that it sucked, but Lu Han knew that in minutes, all that would be forgotten. He knew because he'd done it before as well. He'd really been sorry, though. It did suck.

Life was full of moments like these. Knowing and not knowing were two sides of the same coin. Knowing, and knowing, on the other hand...

Palms sweaty in the summer, fingers linked, words left unsaid.

Knowing, and not knowing.

The difference between eternity and time, the discrepency between eternity, and forever.

The first word Zhongren had taught him had been saranghaeyo.

The girl had rejected him when she'd asked.

"I like you as a friend," she'd said. She'd smiled. He likes her dimples, and he'd smiled too.

"Saranghaeyo means I love you," Zhongren had told him patiently. Lu Han had laughed.

"Zhongzhong already knows about things like love?" Lu Han had teased. Zhongren had blushed a furious red, and had mumbled something about it being the first thing he'd learned to say in Chinese. Lu Han takes pity on him on account of his face, and doesn't press.

Years later, Lu Han doesn't understand why these two memories are intertwined. Time, he supposes. It's always a tricky one.

if you don't turn this into a happy ending for layhan

waves finger at you

hides and whispers: i don't believe in happy endings and crawls away

shoots you with my bazooka

well it's not a sad ending? n_n

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part seventy six

hg: 5cm per second (split half lay half kai please?)

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